


It's No Sacrifice

by shaypotter



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, F/M, I love this team!!!, M/M, but I can't help but put little nudges towards my other loves, fjord/jester focused for sure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-20
Updated: 2018-04-20
Packaged: 2019-04-25 13:17:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14379462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shaypotter/pseuds/shaypotter
Summary: Somewhere on the road to Rexxentrum the group encounters trouble.





	It's No Sacrifice

He blinks awake with nothing but the night sky above him and hard packed dirt scraping against his back. His ears can't hear anything other than the slow pounding of his heartbeat before a sudden burst of sound filters through - the cacophony of battle, his friends shouting and grunting with the exertion. Beau's gruff voice rings above the rest, several inventive profanities slipping through her mouth. 

He mentally catalogs what he remembers even as his eyes stay locked on the stars. 

They're somewhere north of Zadash but south of Rexxentrum and they haven't seen a town in a few days. What they _have_ encountered is a hell of a lot of bandits and creatures. Some they've dispensed of quickly while others have taken quite a few of them down. They're all exhausted, running on hardly any sleep, and their provisions are slimmer than what's entirely comfortable. 

"Fjord?" Jester's lilting voice drags his fuzzy mind back to his own body. He's sore all over, soaked with sweat - or maybe blood if the ache in his shoulder is any indication of why he's on the ground. Right. The battle. Below the pain though, he can sense the tell-tale flow of magic through his veins. It's warm, lovely, and a little bit playful as it stitches up the wounds littering his body.

He forces his gaze to lock on her profile, feels the pressure of her knees pressed against his side. Her hands still rest gently on his chest and he lifts a hand to cover her smaller one. Her nose is scrunched up in concentration and her cheeks glimmer with either sweat or tears. "Ay-oh-ay," he mumbles to her, trying to use playfulness to push away the last of his pain. 

Her face, smudged with dirt and a worried frown, lights up above him. The corner of his mouth pulls up in response to her smile. Caleb is shouting in Zimnian somewhere to the left of them and a burst of yellow light illuminates Jester's face briefly (from the wizard's fireball flying past them, no doubt) to some unseen enemy. It's a clear reminder that they aren't out of harm's way yet and he pushes himself up onto an elbow, Jester hovering over him even as he shifts positions. 

"We've got a few more things to handle before we can relax." Jester nods, shaking the hair away from her face and straightening her shoulders. She's matured (in some ways) in the months he's known her and he sees a capable, strong woman in front of him. He wants to rub away the dirt across her delicate cheekbones, to wind his fingers in the tangled mess of hair framing her face, but he just gives her a soft smile instead. 

She stands first and offers him a hand, which he gladly takes. He holds on for a second longer and murmurs, "Thanks. For helping me." She's warm, just like always, and he gives the hand a quick squeeze in thanks before he lets go, turning to see where he's needed. 

Beau and Yasha are working together on the right side of the clearing. Yasha's huge weapon swings with deadly accuracy as she cuts down a man. Blood paints the ground where he stood and Fjord quickly moves his gaze. Beau is right next to her as they tend to do, sparring with a woman that seems to move with speed and reflexes his eyes can't even follow. She's holding her own pretty well and he swells a little with pride to see the focus Beau has grown into. He hopes that they can finish this quick before they have to tap more of Jester's spells - they've been out of potions for a few days due to nasty run in with a giant snake and he'd rather save her spells for healing if they can.

A soft sound, the gentle release of breath, causes him to whip around. What he sees knocks all the air straight out of his chest. 

Jester is standing behind him, her eyes confused and glowing with a deep pain. Her mouth, typically so soft and appealing, is dropped open with surprise. "Oh," is the only word she whispers as her hand moves to grip at the bolt sticking straight through her chest. 

Fjord can only stare with total and complete horror as she first drops to one knee, then the second as her breathing grows shallow. He vaguely hears Nott's furious scream as she takes aim at the man who had shot the bolt at Jester. 

He doesn't know how but he finds the strength to move to her side. Fjord drops to his knees next to her shaking form, reaches to cover her own tiny hand on the bolt and immediately tugs it out, the squelching of her blood and muscles causing his stomach to roll as a terrible scream is ripped from Jester's throat. Blood pools even more around her chest, staining the light armor she wears in battle. He tears his gaze from the bloody mess of her chest and dips his head to find her eyes, barely focused and dazed in their pain.

"Jester, you're gonna be alright now. I know it hurts darlin' but you'll be right back on your feet in a minute, okay?" he smooths a hand over her hair, cupping her jaw, ignoring the blood (his or hers?) that now streaks across her deep blue skin. He hopes his comforting words are enough to pass through the fog of pain he's sure she's suffering through right now. She's just got to heal, just got to whisper the spell that will mend her broken skin and put her right back up on her feet.

The tiefling is barely able to hold herself up so Fjord helps, his hands grabbing her and holding her tight. She laughs, and it's broken and wet like there is blood in her lungs. She just looks at him for a moment, lips trembling, as she explains in a hoarse whisper, "I saved it. I saved it for you." 

He feels his lip curl back in his anger. "If you were this close to going down and you had one left, why would you _ever_ waste it on me?" He growls out, his fingertips digging deep into her arms. He wants to shake her. He want to take the magic she gifted him and pour it right back into her broken form. 

"I always save the last one for you. Just in case." He looks at her. Just watches the way her lashes flutter open and closed, damp with her tears. She smiles, then those long eyelashes drop closed one last time, and then she's still. She slumps over, a rag doll, and Fjord can't fucking breathe. 

He can hear the roar of waves crashing through his eardrums, can feel himself being dragged deeper and deeper into the ocean and he loses the last bits of the air in his lungs. He's drowning and he can't save her, he can't, he can't - 

"BEAU," he yells, voice hoarse and tearing up his throat as it escapes. He hears his friends take notice as they finish up the last of the bandits. 

Nott reaches them first having seen the blow and she kneels next to Jester and Fjord, her slender hands shaking. "I have one potion left," she admits, her fingers tugging a vile off her belt. "I was saving it for..." her green eyes slip to Caleb who is sitting on the ground, head between his knees and breathing heavily. Molly crouches down behind the wizard and rubs a hand over his back, his lips forming words that don't reach Fjord's ears. 

Fjord doesn't say a single word, just stares at Nott and waits. He will rip the vile from her fingers and ruin the tentative trust they've all manged to form if he has to, that's fine, but he'll give Nott the chance to do it on her own first. 

"Here Fjord," she finally squeaks out, her hands shoving it to him like she might change her mind if she waits too long. 

He turns back to Jester, pours the potion down her unwilling throat and waits. 

And waits. 

And waits. 

He's about to lose what little control he's holding tight to when he hears the first hiccup of breath through Jester's lungs. The wound isn't pouring blood any longer and her dark eyes blink open once, twice, before finally opening completely to meet his gaze. 

"Oops," she mutters out, shifting uncomfortably on the dirt. 

Nott begins to fuss over Jester, asking how she's feeling and what it feels like to have died, when Fjord finally moves. His hands slide up Jester's arms to her shoulders, gripping and holding her still as he stares down at her face. And then he gives into his urge to have her close, tugging her into his chest. It's not very comfortable with him kneeling and her barely able to sit up, but it doesn't matter. Not right now. He just holds her tight, eyes closed as his face tucks into the curve of her neck. 

"Nott dear, come over here," Molly calls from over by Caleb's side. Nott gives them a wide eyed glance that Fjord doesn't even see before scampering to her friend's side. 

Jester is motionless in his arms except the rise and fall of her chest as her lungs slowly repair from the damage. "Ay-oh-ay?" she echoes from earlier, her voice hesitant. Her arms go around his shoulders and just rest there, a hand carding through the short hair at the back of his neck. 

He pulls back and stares down at her familiar face. He's known for a while now that while he loves this newfound family of his, but she's... something different. Something scary and uncharted. "Don't you ever do that again. If you..." he chokes on his words, his voice wrecked even to his own ears. "I can't let you do that. You can't do that. Do you understand?" 

Her lips tug into a tiny, secret smile. He fears that she absolutely understands, that she see more than he feels comfortable with. She touches the tips of her fingers to his lips, tracing the curve of his bottom lip. 

"I understand. But technically, they are my spells, _technically_ , and I will do with them what I wish."

He growls again. She grins in response, her hands cupping the back of his head more firmly and tugging him into a kiss. It's sweet and gentle, words he had never pictured when he imagined their first kiss together (and he certainly had imagined this multiples times, in multiple ways). She bites down on his lower lip, playfully, and pulls away even as he moves to bring her back into another kiss. Now that he's had a taste of this feeling, both of loss and total joy, he's too weak to ignore it any longer. "Fjord," she giggles, her hand pushing back on his chest as her eyes slip towards their friends hovering behind them. 

"I _knew_ you two were an item!" Nott gleefully cries, her tiny green fist pumping into the air. "You owe me twenty gold!" she shouts to Molly. Fjord just groans and buries his face back into Jester's shoulder, hoping that he can disappear even as Jester's body shakes with laughter underneath him.

**Author's Note:**

> I stayed up until like 4am the other day reading through the Fjord/Jester tag and then I ran out of content, so I obviously had to go and write my own. 
> 
> I am having so much fun with this new group and these characters. I hope you're all having as much fun with them as I am!!


End file.
